The Cancers
One of the great challenges of facing prostate cancer is understanding the wide range of prostate cancer severity. The first step after a diagnosis of prostate cancer is to know which risk category you are in. Several test results (PSA level, Gleason score, and digital exam stage) are combined to determine if a cancer is low, intermediate, or high risk.
If you don't know your risk category, you may calculate it below.
Risk Assessment:
The treatment choices available to patients vary for this wide spectrum of cancers. Some do not require treatment at all, while others require an everything-but-the-kitchen-sink approach. Some of these cancers are highly curable, while others cannot be cured but can be controlled for many years. For those beyond cure, the goal of treatment shifts to control. Fortunately, there are a number of advances in the treatment of prostate cancer that allow men with incurable prostate cancer to live years and sometimes decades with the disease.
After a diagnosis of prostate cancer men have time to make a thoughtful decision. The best approach is to:
- Understand where they are on the spectrum of prostate cancer.
Is the cancer low risk, intermediate risk, high risk, or metastatic? - List the proven treatments for that specific prostate cancer type
- Choose from among the proven treatment options the approach the individual prefers.
The real challenge is that for the same cancers there may be many excellent proven options. The adage “ two rights don’t make a wrong” is often extended to “three, four, and five rights don’t make a wrong.” Inevitably, men want to know the best treatment and to break the tie by stacking the negatives of one treatment against the positives of another. In truth, all treatments have compelling advantages and limited disadvantages. The best treatment will change with the seriousness of the cancer, so the choices that one man makes for his specific cancer will differ from those of another man with a differing conditions. That is why asking a friend or relative what he did may not always apply to their situation. With education and processing of emotions one can define the "best treatment for me" and feel very comfortable with it.
Click here for a discussion of risk categories and the prostate cancer spectrum.
Click here to proceed to the songs.
A much more in-depth discussion of all aspects of prostate cancer is available at the University of Michigan / Providence Implant Program website.